Everyday is Just Another
by icanbeperfectforyou
Summary: A collection of random oneshots, about random things and ideas that pop into may head. Different times, places, even alternate universes. Warning there may be a lot of fluff, but why would you expect anything else from me?
1. Chapter 1

The day started off normally. It seemed like an average Monday. Fourth grader Henry woke up at the normal time. He ate a normal breakfast, got dressed, brushed his teeth, and got on the bus. He got to school and walked into his classroom. That's when the day became not so normal.

Standing next to the teacher's desk was a shy looking girl with curly brown hair and a tall man who looked like her dad. The man was talking to the teacher while the girl stood there quietly. They were turned around so Henry couldn't see their faces.

The class was all talking about the new girl. Henry took his seat. The man gave the girl a kiss on the head and walked away. The teacher said a few words to the girl, then they both walked to the front of the class.

"Alright, class," Mrs. Hill said loudly. "As you can see, we have a new student today. Natalie, why don't you introduce yourself to the class."

Henry was amazed. She was the prettiest girl he had ever seen. His mom had always told him to never fall in love because it would bring nothing but pain. Then she would start complaining about how men were awful and how they were all jerks. That was a while ago, though, his mom had recently remarried and now all she talked about was how great it was to have someone there for her. She was even going to have a baby.

"Um, hi, I'm Natalie Goodman and I'm ten years old," the new girl said a little quietly. Henry thought Natalie was the most beautiful name ever.

"What brings you here to our school?" Mrs. Hill asked.

Natalie looked angry, and a bit sad too. "My house burned down."

Mrs. Hill nodded. "I see. What do you like to do for fun?"

"I like to play piano," she replied. The new girl liked piano? Henry liked piano! Henry thought that this meant they were soulmates or something. Maybe they'd get married. Could eleven year olds get married?

"Do you have any siblings?" Mrs. Hill asked yet another question.

Natalie seemed to think about this for a while. "No," she said finally.

"Well, Natalie, we need to find you a place to sit," Mrs. Hill scanned the room. The desks were pushed together, in pairs. Henry was one of the few kids who had no partner.

_Pick the desk next to mine! _Henry mentally screamed.

"Why don't you sit next to Henry? Henry, raise your hand so Natalie knows where to sit," Henry could hardly breathe, but he raised his hand. "Maybe you can straighten him out a bit," Mrs. Hill chuckled like she was joking, but Henry knew she was at least half serious. Henry tried to be a good kid and pay attention in class and do his homework. It's just that school was so _boring._

"Hey," Henry squeaked as Natalie took a seat next to him.

Natalie gave him a strange look. "Hey," she replied.

"So, uh, how did your house burn down?" It was the first thing Henry could think of saying.

Again, Natalie looked like she was thinking about it. "I don't know," she said, but she sounded unsure.

"I play piano too," Henry said awkwardly. Natalie just nodded.

"Cool."

While Henry was thinking of something else to say, another girl, Emma, turned to face them.

"Hi! I'm Emma!" Emma was a very chatty, outgoing girl who was friends with pretty much everybody. "You can sit with us at lunch, if you want to."

Natalie nodded. "Ok."

Natalie seemed like a shy girl, but hopefully soon she would become friendlier. The class was nice to her. Henry was sure she would fit right in.

**A/N: So basically this is going to be a group of oneshots. Many will be HenNat fluff, yes, (as cheers arise) but hopefully I will write some that aren't. I can't make any guarantees though! :) HenNat fluff is just so much fun to write! Yay! Bye!**


	2. Chapter 2

Natalie jumped a little when she heard the practice room door open. She turned in her seat slightly. It was that same kid who she met yesterday. She continued playing.

"Hey," Henry said. Natalie didn't reply. He walked into the room more.

"So is this stalking thing going to become an everyday occurence?" she asked, finally turning to face him. He looked slightly hurt.

"No. I'm not a stalker. I just want to be your friend," he said sincerely, pulling a chair over to the piano and sitting down.

"I don't have any friends," Natalie said. Henry smiled a little.

"Neither do I," he said. Natalie stopped playing and stood up.

Henry looked up, confused. "You said you like to play. So play," she said.

Henry sat down at the piano and began to hit keys seemingly at random. He played an upbeat song, not at all like the classical Natalie was used to. When he finished he looked proudly up at Natalie.

"What the hell was that?" Natalie asked. It wasn't like any song she had heard before.

Henry's smile grew larger. "It's called improvisation. You should try it some time. Jazz is way more fun than that boring classical you like."

"It's not about being fun. It's about getting the notes right, so I can get into Yale and get out of here," Natalie explained.

"Who says you can't have a little fun in between?" asked Henry. The conversation went on like this for a few minutes, until the bell rang. They both got up to get their stuff.

"This was fun. Do you mind if I come back tomorrow, or...?" Henry asked.

Natalie shrugged. "You'd be here anyway, wouldn't you?"

Henry smiled. "You're right. Bye!" And with that they left the practice room.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Lunchtime. Most high schooler's favorite part of the school day.

It was Natalie's least favorite.

Lunchtime was the time where Natalie got to sit alone in her corner, constantly being reminding that nobody liked her. Where she would open her lunch up and get reminded that her mother didn't love her. Someone else had taken the practice room during her lunch, so she got to sit in her corner and eat her lunch and pretend that she was fine, that she didn't care that she was shunned, that she liked being alone.

She opened up her lunch bag to find a ham sandwich. Of course her mom forgot she was a vegetarian. Her mom didn't care. She only cared about her precious son.

She began angrily picking the ham off of the bread. At least there was lettuce.

"Hey," a voice came from behind her. It was Henry, holding a lunch tray. "Do you mind if I sit with you?"

Natalie shrugged. "Sure," she continued picking off the ham. Henry looked like he was going to sit next to her, then reconsidered and slid in across from her.

"Um, what are you doing to that sandwich?" he asked. Natalie glared up at him.

"My mom forgot I was a vegetarian. Here, you can have it," she put the ham on Henry's tray.

"How does your mom forget you're a vegetarian?" Henry asked, confused.

Natalie rolled her eyes angrily. "You know. My mom's crazy. Everyone knows. That's why I sit alone. My mom doesn't care about me."

Henry blinked, taken aback by the angry rush of words. It became clear that Natalie did not want to talk about it.

Natalie looked back into her lunch bag. There was a water bottle and a plastic bag of potato chips. "I hate potato chips," she sighed, pulling the back out and putting it, too, on Henry's tray.

"You should eat more than just lettuce on bread and water for lunch. Here, I'll get you a salad," Henry stood up and ran off before Natalie could protest.

He came back a minute later and handed her a bowl of salad. "Uh, I didn't know what dressing you like, so I just grabbed one of each," he held out several packets of salad dressing.

"Thanks," Natalie muttered, taking the salad and the packets. Henry sat back down.

"What are friends for?" he smiled, taking a bite of his lunch.

_Friends. _People usually did not use the word 'friends' when talking about Natalie, unless someone was talking about her lack of them. Still, she felt slightly happy. She had a friend. Happiness wasn't a common feeling for Natalie.

She spent the rest of lunch talking about piano with Henry. When the bell rang, they both got up and Natalie realized they had the next class together. So they kept talking as they walked to class. Henry actually seemed to care about what Natalie had to say. He kept calling her 'Nat', a name she thought was lame and childish when her dad was the one saying it, but for some odd reason, she didn't mind it when Henry said it. She didn't know why. But she felt that maybe, she might have a friend for once.

**A/N: More HenNat? Yes. Why? Because I can. Please review and give me more suggestions on what to write! Bye!**


	3. Chapter 3

"Fuck," Natalie muttered. First she had missed the bus, now her locker was jammed. This day was just going _great._ And it had barely even started.

"Hey," A voice made her jump. She managed to open her locker. She turned slightly. It was Henry.

"Hey," she sighed, putting away her backpack and grabbing her books.

"Is everything alright? I waited for you in the practice room but you never came. Did I do something?" Henry asked.

"No, you did nothing. My morning has just sucked so far. I missed the bus, so my dad had to drive me," Natalie said, recalling the earlier events.

"Why did you miss the bus?" Henry was curious.

"My mom-she-" Natalie couldn't finish. She had never outright told Henry what was wrong with her mother, but the entire school knew that she was crazy.

Henry nodded. Natalie shut her locker and they headed off to homeroom. "So, Natalie, I was wondering if maybe sometime this week you could come over to my house after school and we could do homework and just hang out and shit," he said nervously.

_No. _Natalie wanted to say. _My life is too fucked up. I can't. _She wanted to walk away. To let Henry find some other friends that wouldn't be as messed up as she was.

But she said "Sure."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Dan sipped his coffee and sighed. It was early in the morning, and he was all alone in the kitchen. Diana was still asleep, Natalie was getting ready for school, and Dan was alone with his thoughts. This happened very rarely. Something was always going on in the Goodman house.

His peace and quiet was interrupted by the sound of Natalie coming downstairs into the kitchen. "Good morning," Dan said to his daughter.

Natalie grabbed a granola bar out of the pantry. "I'm going over to a friend's house after school today," she said, unwrapping the bar.

Dan wasn't sure if he heard her right. "You're going over to a friend's house?"

Natalie rolled her eyes. "Contrary to popular belief, I actually do have friends. One friend. And I'm going over to his house today. Just letting you know."

"Wait..._his _house?" Dan repeated. "Are you...you know..."

Natalie cut him off. "No. He's my friend, and that's it. His name is Henry, his mom will be home, and all we're going to do is study and do homework."

"How long have you been friends?" Dan asked. Natalie didn't really have friends. Anyone who'd ever been her friend had gotten scared off by Diana. Dan felt sorry about that, but he never expressed that to Natalie.

"Just a few weeks. We just, like, hang out at school. He plays piano too," she explained. "Why do you even care?"

Dan shook his head. "It's nothing," Did his daughter have a boyfriend? Why hadn't she told them about it before?

"Just let mom know that I won't be here. Not like she'd notice anyway..." Natalie muttered. She grabbed her bag and headed out the front door. "Bye," she called.

"Bye," said Dan, but she was gone already.

**A/N: I think I've been writing too much HenNat fluff...so I tried to tone it down a little...it didn't really work.**


	4. Chapter 4

Natalie flipped through the pages in her book. She wasn't actually reading it, she was using it as a distraction to try to push out the memory of a few days ago. Unfortunately for her, the memory stayed right in the front of her mind.

A tiny dark splotch appeared on the page in front of her. And then another. And another. Natalie suddenly realized she was crying. She never cried. But what else do you do when life crashes? When you know not even God was on your side?

Someone knocked at the door. "Nat?" her dad's voice floated in through the door. Slowly, he opened the door. "You okay?"

"Don't call me Nat," Natalie replied. Pet names were Dan's way of trying to be comforting, to make her feel like everything was okay, even though it would never be. Not for Natalie.

"Look, I'm sorry, you know your mother-" he reached his hand out, but Natalie swatted it away.

"I don't believe you," she said.

"Really, I'm sorry, I can't control what happens to your mother-" he said, but Natalie knew he was lying. He wasn't sorry.

"Sorry doesn't cut it, _Dad._ Maybe it did before. Maybe you just thought we could hug and everything would be a-okay. But not this time. I was fine before, when Mom wouldn't remember it was my birthday. I already know she doesn't love me. But I hoped that at least a little, you would care," she snapped.

"I do care, it's just that, it's so hard sometimes, dealing with your mother," Dan said in a way that tried to be gentle and comforting. But Natalie had gone far beyond being able to be comforted.

"Do you, Dad? Do you really care? Then how come it was my_ thirteenth birthday_ and no one even said anything?_ Thirteen._ You only become a teenager once. And you missed it," Natalie hissed, trying not to cry.

Dan's face was expressionless. "I got you something," he said, and left the room. Natalie bitterly wiped the tears from her eyes as she waited to see what her Dad had gotten for her this time to try to make things better.

A tiny gray kitten padded into the room. It had a red ribbon tied around it's neck. It mewled quietly, and Natalie had to admit it was adorable.

"Happy birthday," Dan said quietly. _My birthday was three days ago_, Natalie wanted to say.

But for now, she would accept his peace offering.

**A/N: What? No HenNat fluff? Not today! I tried to cut back. Anyway, I don't like begging for reviews, but I'd really appreciate if you did, because I'm running out of ideas for what to write! Bye!**


	5. Chapter 5

Henry slammed his finger against the button. Still nothing. He sighed. His locker was jammed-again. Great, now he probably seemed like one of those dumb freshmen who ran to every class. Which he was, but he didn't want to seem like it.

It was a few weeks into his freshman year in high school, and Henry was extremely stressed. Sure, his eighth grade teachers had told him high school was hard, but still, he hadn't expected it to be _this _hard. They kept piling on the homework. Didn't they understand that he just had three months of doing absolutely nothing?

Henry carefully turned the dial and tried again. It didn't move. Now the older kids would laugh at him. They'd call him a "stupid freshman", _again,_ and probably steal his backpack or do some other mean thing. He got to deal with that, on top of the homework, and he had to go home and take care of his baby sister, and he hardly had any time to play video games!

Like, he knew it was going to be hard, but this was really hard. Henry had never been the smartest kid in class-that was Natalie Goodman-but at least he was average. Now, not only were his classes hard, they were also really boring. He didn't mean to stop paying attention and start daydreaming in class, the teachers just didn't make learning very exciting! And it wasn't his fault that Natalie Goodman was in all of his classes! It wasn't _Henry's _fault that she was so pretty, and so smart, and she just looked so interested, so _eager_ to learn, that he just couldn't stop staring at her in class!

Henry slowly tried one more time. Success! The locker swung open, and he began to put his books away and grab the one's he needed for homework.

"Hey, Henry," a voice came from beside him. Henry flinched, preparing to get beaten up by the older kids. When nothing happened, he turned around. It was his next door neighbor, who was the same age as him. They were sort of friends, considering they had lived next to each other for their whole lives. He was the closest thing Henry had to a best friend.

"Uh, hey, Adam," Henry replied, closing his locker. Adam smiled at him.

"Listen, can you come over today? I've...I've got something I need to show you," his voice dropped to a whisper. He sounded slightly nervous, but also very excited at the same time.

"Sure, I have to check in with my mom first, but yeah," Henry replied.

"Cool. See ya!" And with that, Adam walked away. Henry scrambled out to his bus to avoid being made fun of more.

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Henry stood on Adam's front porch, excited and scared to see what Adam had planned. Sometimes Adam and Henry got along, they would hang out. But other times...Henry didn't like to talk about it.

Adam opened the door and quickly ushered Henry up to his bedroom, where he locked the door. Henry was afraid of what would happen next.

With a grin, Adam quickly pulled out a plastic bag of...something. A bright blue thing was laying on Adam's bed. Adam took a puff of it.

"What is _that?_" Henry asked nervously, because it looked sort of illegal. Adam smirked.

"Pot. My older brother hooked me up with some. It's way calming, and it, like, takes the edge off of life. Everything's less stressful. Try it," he held it out to Henry, who took it.

Soon, Henry felt happier than he had felt so far in the school year. Everything was so much nicer. He understood what Adam had said. An hour passed, and Henry had to go home for dinner.

"This is for you," Adam said, handing Henry a bag for him with a bright green bong in it and some pot. He showed him how to use it, and Henry left.

The minute he got home, he quickly stashed it under his bed and prayed his mom would never find it. Henry knew he would use it a lot. Maybe now he would be able to pass school. And maybe now he would have the confidence to talk to Natalie Goodman.

Yeah, right. There wasn't enough pot in the world to give him that much confidence.

**A/N: ...I had to. I was unbelievably excited to write this. It's all I could think of at school today. Like, my teacher looked at my paper, and said "Good job, Veronica," and all I could think was "Heh, he has no idea that I'm going home and writing a story about how a teenage boy gets addicted to drugs!" Ha! Anyway PLEASE give me more ideas because I literally only have two left. Seriously. Bye!**


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